Email system for preventing inadvertant transmission of proprietary message or documents to unintended recipient

ABSTRACT

A system that alerts a sender of an email message as to the addressees of the email, when the email is determined to be sensitive, such as when it includes a word such a “confidential”. The user can allow the message to be sent or go back to a mail create/edit operation where the message or list of addresses can be revised. Trigger words can be stored in a table or database. The system also detects sensitive words in attachments. The sensitive words detected and their locations can be shown in a pop-up message.

CROSS-REFERENCE TO RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a U.S. Continuation Patent Application filed under37 USC 1.53(b) claiming the benefit of U.S. application Ser. No.12/831,456, filed Jul. 7, 2010, the disclosure of which is incorporatedherein by reference.

BACKGROUND

1. Field

The present invention is directed to a system that can preventconfidential or proprietary email messages from being inadvertentlysent.

2. Description of the Related Art

Proprietary or otherwise sensitive or confidential information isroutinely exchanged during the ordinary course of business. While theerrant or inadvertent transmission of proprietary information in theform a “hard-copy” is rare, such is not the case when proprietaryinformation is included in electronic form (e.g., electronic mail, or“e-mail”.) It is not at all uncommon that email is misaddressed in hasteor simply as the result of an oversight. In that event, proprietaryinformation can and does fall into the wrong hands, e.g., a businesscompetitor or the adverse party in a legal proceeding, too frequently.What is needed is the addition of at least two steps in the process ofcreating and transmitting electronic messages in order to preventinadvertent disclosure of sensitive information. The first additionalstep is one that scans the content of the email, including anyattachments, for markings that indicate it includes proprietaryinformation (e.g., “Proprietary” header and/or footer, etc.). The secondadditional step requests that the sender confirm that the email andattachments are intended for the specific addressee(s).

SUMMARY

It is an aspect of the embodiments to provide a system that alerts theuser in order to prevent confidential or proprietary email messages frombeing sent to an unintended recipient inadvertently.

The above aspects can be attained by a system that alerts a user with amessage pop-up when an email message is to be sent that may besensitive, such as when it includes a word such a “confidential”. Theuser can allow the message to be sent or go back to a mail create/editoperation where the message and/or addressees can be revised. Triggerwords can be stored in a table or database. The system also detectssensitive words in attachments. The sensitive words detected and theirlocations can be shown in the pop-up message.

These together with other aspects and advantages which will besubsequently apparent, reside in the details of construction andoperation as more fully hereinafter described and claimed, referencebeing had to the accompanying drawings forming a part hereof, whereinlike numerals refer to like parts throughout.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 illustrates a computer network that can be used to transmitproprietary or otherwise confidential information in electronic form.

FIG. 2 illustrates some markings that might typically be used to alert arecipient or a reader that the information included in a transmission isproprietary or confidential.

FIG. 3 diagrams the high level steps that typically occur in drafting anemail up to the point that network transmission is initiated. For theexample, the use of the public Internet is assumed as the transmissionmedium.

FIG. 4 extends the process diagramed in FIG. 3 in order to affect thecheck and alert/confirm aspects of the subject invention.

FIG. 5 illustrates the “Confirmation Request” that a sender ofproprietary information might see in order to prevent inadvertenttransmission.

FIG. 6 depicts scanning in more detail.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE EMBODIMENTS

Proprietary information is commonly exchanged among business partners orpotential partners. When it is, confidentiality is or may be critical toa successful venture, and therefore the unintended disclosure ofproprietary information can have disastrous effects.

In the modern times, most if not all business data is exchangedelectronically, for example by electronic mail (“email”) via the publicInternet (“Internet”). FIG. 1 illustrates how businesses are connectedvia the Internet, and specifically illustrates a sender's computer 101and a recipient's computer 103, and their respective email servers 102and 104. Typically, the sender uses widely available word processing,spreadsheet, presentation-builder, and/or client email applicationsresident on his/her computer to create and store documents. Whenproprietary or sensitive information is included in these documents, itis common that the author and/or sender will add a caption to alert anyrecipient as to the confidential nature of the information.Representative markings are shown by reference numbers 201, 202, and 203in FIG. 2.

When a sender wishes to share proprietary information that's beenprepared as described above, they will ordinarily transmit it via theInternet. As is commonly done today, an email is drafted (see FIG. 3)301 and addressed 302 using the client application on the sender'scomputer 101. Attachments and “Proprietary” markings, e.g., 201, areadded 303 as applicable. When the user is ready to send the email, she“presses” the “send” button 304 on her email tool. From there, thesender's computer 101 makes a network connection to an email server 102,and the email makes its way from sender, to receiver's email server 104and computer 103. Assuming that the sender intended for that receiver tohave the information in or attached to the email, the desired result hasbeen achieved.

It can and does happen that email is errantly addressed and thereforeends up in the possession of an unintended recipient. To catch theunintended error and prevent this undesirable result, operations 402-405of FIG. 4 can, by way of example, be inserted in the process. After thesender “presses” the “send” button 401 and before the client emailapplication may make a network connection 406 to its email server 102,the system detects the send button activation and scans the email andattachments (as applicable) for words indicative of sensitiveinformation 402. The message is examined, for example, for the words“proprietary”, or “confidential”, or “sensitive”, etc. This can beaccomplished in the same way that “spell checking” is implemented (orincluded as part of that same step, if enabled, for that matter.) Notethat a custom dictionary of “trigger” words could optionally also becompiled by the individual user or user's agency, and used during thescreening 402. The scanning process includes scanning the email messageand attachments, including the email subject line, headers, footers,notes, body text, file name, etc. and any other parts of the messagethat can be labeled with or include a trigger word, such as meta data.

In the event that one of any of the recognizable words is found 403, ineither the email or the attachments, the application displays a“Confirmation Request” 404 in the form of a “pop-up” 501 (see FIG. 5) onthe display of the sender's computer 101. The pop-up warns the senderthat she is about to send proprietary information 502, displays theaddressee's email address 503, and requests that the sender either“approve” 504 the transmission, in which case the application makes theconnection 406 to the email server 102 to continue the conventionaltransmission sequence, or the user can “cancel” 505 the transmission andreturn the sender to any of the email drafting steps coming before thesend button is activated 401. This will allow the user to revise themessage.

As depicted in FIG. 6, the system can scan 601 the email message,including subject line, etc. for trigger words that can be stored in atrigger word database 602. If a trigger word is found, 603, theconfirmation request pop-up is displayed 404. If no trigger words arefound in the email message, the system can check 604 to see if themessage has attachments. If there are attachments, the type of the firstattachments can be determined 605. When the attachments type is an imagetype, the attachment is opened and an optical charter recognitionprocess can be executed 606 to produce a text file of words in the imagefile. When the file type of the attachment is a spread sheet, the cellsof the spread sheet can be converted 607 into a text file. When the filetype is text, the file can be opened and the text can scanned for thetrigger word of the database 602. Then, a determination 603 can be madeas to whether trigger words have been found. Again, if trigger words arefound, the pop-up can be displayed 404. When no trigger words are found,the system can check 604 to see if additional attachments are attachedto the email message.

The embodiments have been described with the pop-up confirmation beingdisplayed when a trigger word is discovered, this can occur when atrigger word is first encountered and it is possible to scan the messageand all attachments for trigger words before displaying the pop-up andalso provide a list indicating where and what trigger words can be foundin the message and/or attachments.

The alert has been described as a pop-up message; the alert can alsoinclude a sound alert as well as other alerting techniques such as ablinking red box surrounding the pop-up message.

The embodiments have been described with respect to the scan operationbeing performed by the client computer 101; however, the scanning can beperformed by the server or another machine. The embodiments have beendescribed as using a client computer (such as a desktop, laptop, tablet,etc.) to create the email, attach the attachments, send, etc.; however,it is possible for other types of devices to create and send the email,for example, a handheld digital assistant, a smart telephone, a smartcellular telephone, etc.

The embodiments have been discussed with respect to performing the wordsearch for sensitive words being initiated by the SEND button beingpressed. However, the checking can occur based on other events. Forexample, the checking can be initiated when an address is added to theaddress filed of a message. As another example, the checking can run inthe background much like a spell checker and alert the user whenever asensitive word is added to the message, that is, the checking can beinitiated or started by the creation of an email message or the start ofthe text. In this situation, it is also possible to set a flag for theproduction of an alert during the creation of the message when it isbeing drafted and then pop-up the alert when an address is added to themessage address field. The checking can also occur, particularly for anattachment, when or each time an attachment is attached to a message.

The embodiments can be implemented in computing hardware (computingapparatus) and/or software, such as (in a non-limiting example) anycomputer that can store, retrieve, process and/or output data and/orcommunicate with other computers. The results produced can be displayedon a display of the computing hardware. A program/software implementingthe embodiments may be recorded on a computer-readable media, e.g., anon-transitory or persistent computer-readable medium. Theprogram/software implementing the embodiments may also be transmittedover a transmission communication path, e.g., a network implemented viahardware. Examples of the non-transitory or persistent computer-readablemedia include a magnetic recording apparatus, an optical disk, amagneto-optical disk, and/or a semiconductor memory (for example, RAM,ROM, etc.). Examples of the magnetic recording apparatus include a harddisk device (HDD), a flexible disk (FD), and a magnetic tape (MT).Examples of the optical disk include a DVD (Digital Versatile Disc), aDVD-RAM, a CD-ROM (Compact Disc-Read Only Memory), and a CD-R(Recordable)/RW. An example of communication media via which theprogram/software may be sent includes, for example, a carrier-wavesignal.

The many features and advantages of the invention are apparent from thedetailed specification and, thus, it is intended by the appended claimsto cover all such features and advantages of the invention that fallwithin the true spirit and scope of the invention. Further, sincenumerous modifications and changes will readily occur to those skilledin the art, it is not desired to limit the invention to the exactconstruction and operation illustrated and described, and accordinglyall suitable modifications and equivalents may be resorted to, fallingwithin the scope of the invention.

What is claimed is:
 1. A method, comprising: specifying trigger words ina trigger word table before a message is sent where the trigger wordsindicate proprietary, confidential or sensitive material; detectinginitiation of sending of an email message by detecting activation of asend function; scanning, by an email system, the message for the triggerwords of the trigger word table indicating that a message may includeproprietary, confidential or sensitive material where the messagecomprises a message body and message attachments; alerting the user,that the user is about to send a message when the message includes oneor more of the trigger words, with a pop-up display message comprising alist of trigger words found, locations in the message body and messageattachments of the trigger words found and an email address of the emailmessage recipient; allowing the user to approve sending the message andsending the message using an icon; and allowing the user to disapprovesending the message and initiate revising the message using anothericon.
 2. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein the trigger words areselected to stop sending of the email message determined as comprisingconfidential, proprietary or sensitive material.
 3. A method as recitedin claim 1, wherein the user is alerted directly when one or more of thetrigger words are first found.
 4. A method as recited in claim 1,wherein the alerting is triggered by an exact match with one or more ofthe trigger words.
 5. A method as recited in claim 1, wherein thecorresponding locations of the one or more of the trigger wordsdetermined to be included in the at least one of the message body andthe attachment of the email message respectively identify the one ormore of the trigger words as being located in one or more of a subjectline, the message body and the attachment.
 6. A system, comprising: anemail server computer; and an email client computer allowingspecification of trigger words in a trigger word table before a messageis sent where the trigger words indicate proprietary, confidential orsensitive material, detecting initiation of sending of an email messageby detecting activation of a send function., scanning, by an emailsystem, the message for the trigger words of the trigger word tableindicating that a message may include proprietary, confidential orsensitive material where the message comprises a message body andmessage attachments, alerting the user, that the user is about to send amessage when the message includes one or more of the trigger words, witha pop-up display message comprising a list of trigger words found,locations in the message body and message attachments of the triggerwords found and an email address of the email message recipient,allowing the user to approve sending the message and sending the messageusing an icon and allowing the user to disapprove sending the messageand initiate revising the message using another icon.
 7. Anon-transitory computer readable storage storing a process, comprising:specifying trigger words in a trigger word table before a message issent where the trigger words indicate proprietary, confidential orsensitive material; detecting initiation of sending of an email messageby detecting activation of a send function; scanning, by an emailsystem, the message for the trigger words of the trigger word tableindicating that a message may include proprietary, confidential orsensitive material where the message comprises a message body andmessage attachments; alerting the user, that the user is about to send amessage when the message includes one or more of the trigger words, witha pop-up display message comprising a list of trigger words found,locations in the message body and message attachments of the triggerwords found and an email address of the email message recipient;allowing the user to approve sending the message and sending the messageusing an icon; and allowing the user to disapprove sending the messageand initiate revising the message using another icon.
 8. A displaycomprising a pop-up message indicating a message to be sent is asensitive message the pop-up display message includes a surroundingborder that blinks, an indication that the user is about to send themessage with one or more of trigger words determined as indicatingconfidential, proprietary or sensitive material, an email address of anaddressee of the email message and corresponding locations of the one ormore of the trigger words in the email message.